Defeated Pride
by Saturn Phoenix Frrosty
Summary: Earth has lost the war.....


Okay, this is the completed version of the original draft that eventually became my fic In Time. You could possibly think of it as an AU prequel in which the Yeerks are not defeated. It is about six after The Invasion, and I assumed they were 14-ish then, making Jake about 20. Review!  
  
  
  
            Defeated Pride  
  
                                 _   Pride Goeth Before A Fall......_  
  
  
My name was ....... my name? What was my name? It's been so long. Ah, yes. Once, my name was Jake. In the small amount of time I am myself in the yeerk pool I often find myself thinking of the past, and how I could have prevented this. Once, I was an Animorph, a word which, most likely, means less than nothing to you. But that was before the end, before the Yeerks conquered Earth, and freedom became a thing of the past...  
  
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In the end, it was our own foolish pride which led to our downfall.   
My pride. I was Jake, leader of the Animorphs. I could never fail. I could never be captured. I took stupid risks. And I paid dearly for them.   
  
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Rachel pointed out to me, on more than one occasion, that I was being stupid. I, of course, ignored her. What did she know? I knew what I was doing. I had been the leader of the Animorphs for several years, and was doing very well, largely without the help of my friends. _I_ didn't need her or anyone else's advice.  
  
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The end came fairly quickly. The Yeerks launched an all-out attack on the Earth. The US military quickly became involved in the war.  
Once our role in the battle against the battle against the Yeerks was discovered, we were offered positions within the military. I refused, and the others decided that the Animorphs should stick together.  
We occasionally joined forces with them, but mostly we worked alone, going after any weak spots we found in the Yeerks defense.  
We were sure we could defeat them. We had kept them at bay for the past six years. Now that the rest of the world was aware of the threat and involved in the war, we assumed it would be a relatively simple matter to wipe them out.  
But it wasn't.  
  
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An attack was planned on the Yeerk Mother ship, which had docked in northern Mexico, which had been captured fairly early in the war by the Yeerks. The Animorphs would, of course, provide backup for the military.   
The attack went badly from the beginning. It had been discovered afterwards that one of the higher ranking officials had been controller all long and the Yeerks had known about it from the beginning.   
Cassie, Rachel, Tobias, and Marco were captured that day. The next time they were seen they were Vissers 6, 7, 8, 9. Ax and I escaped and were once again asked to officially join the military. Ax quickly agreed, but I demanded to be put in charge or not join at all. The president reluctantly agreed.  
And the world's fate was sealed.  
  
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I decided that the best defense would be to send all of our troops to the border of the country, where yeerk activity was highest.  
It was assumed that any people our armies and free cities were not controllers, as known Yeerk pool entrances were under constant guard.  
Ax disagreed with my decisions.  
"Prince Jake, if you make any mistakes, this could be fatal. You really should be-"  
"_I_ am in charge here!"  
  
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It was doomed to fail. There were far too many angles I'd missed, too many actions I didn't take. In the end the Yeerks simply went after the capitol, and defense was so poor they it was over in a few hours.  
The city was overtaken and infested within hours.  
I was infested by Visser 2 and have remained so for the past twenty years...  
The other are dead, and killed by Visser 2's own orders.   
But they are free.  
  
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Was that really bad? Should I disown it?  
Jake just sort of came a cross as annoying, I thought. Oh, well. Opinions? 


End file.
